The description, documentation and revival of Gamilaraay Yuwaalaraay
Gamilaraay and Yuwaalaraay are Australian Indigenous languages which had almost totally fallen out of use, apart from a few words, and which are now being revived. The paper details the records and analyses of the languages and the current efforts to revive them. The most important sources of information include publications from 1860 onwards, and a number of unpublished materials. There are important sources from the 19th century, more detailed information from the first half of the 20th, while the period from 1950 to 1980 saw the most detailed information and analysis, benefiting from the greatly increased understanding of Australian Indigenous languages and the advent of tape recorders. From 1980 on work on the languages has consisted of revisiting the older sources to refine and expand the description of the languages, and more recently also lexical development, so they can be used to talk about new realities.
Publication history
This paper considers the recording, description and trajectory of Gamilaraay Yuwaalaraay (henceforth GY), languages of the northern inland of New South Wales and adjacent Queensland, in the context of the determination of GY people to revive usage of their languages. This revival has been part of part of a rise in similar efforts, both globally and in Australia, particularly since the 1990s. The main known records and descriptions of GY from around the 1840s up to the 1970s are described. The earlier materials up to 1950 ’ are quite limited, consisting of perhaps 100 to 150 pages in total. On the other hand, there are several hundred pages from the 1950s and some 50 hours of tapes from the 1970s. A review of more recent work on the languages follows. Williams’ (1980) 200 page Grammar of Yuwaalaraay was a substantial advance on previous analyses. Gamilaraay publications include Austin (1992, 1993a, 1993b) and Austin and Nathan (1996). Giacon (2001) focuses on Yuwaalaraay, while Giacon (2017) relates to both languages. Austin (2008) discusses the earlier Gamilaraay records and gives information about Gamilaraay people with knowledge of the language in the 1970s and 1980s. Finally, recent substantially increased research into and use of the languages is described.
Funding
Open Access publication of this article was funded through a Transformative Agreement with Australian National University.